Low Carb Low Budget

[flyingcloud]

This may not be the best place - wasn't sure whether to try here or the weight loss section.

Inspired by another thread (and trying to lose weight).

I (and others) are looking for low budget, low carb suggestions.

Meat - is fairly expensive and there are only so many eggs I can eat.

Any ideas, recipes, etc, greatly appreciated.

Great idea!

We buy cheese on the 2-for-1 deals and freeze it for later use.

Meat - yes it's expensive but I buy huuuuge chickens and cut them up myself, make stock from the carcass, and one big chicken will feed us all for 3 meals (me, dh and 13yo dd).

A favourite in our house is anything with mince. Tesco do a big 1kg value pack for £2.

i use lidl....meats,cheeses and green veg all fairly cheap.

Thanks Oops.

See I try to limit the amount of mince and processed meats to once a week. Although it is great. Mince can be fairly high in fat though.

I try to buy organic/free range/fair trade etc where possible (a HUUUUGGE chicken in that bracket costs ?20+ here, non-organic is at least ?10).

Liver is cheap and provided you don't over cook it, surprisingly nice.

Although not strictly low carb, sausage casserole bulked out with a big handful of puy lentils is delish. DH is a confirmed meat eater and was delighted to come home to a big bowl of sausage and lentil cassrole which actually only had one sausage per person in it. He actully cheered.

Chicken thighs much tastier than chicken breast.

Also agree with buying a whole chicken and chopping it up yourslef.

Shin of beef is also very reasonable - I get it from a ponucey organic london butcher and it costs £3 for a pound of meat.

smoked salmon trimmings can also be very reasonable and nice in a salad or added to scrambled eggs to mix it up a bit.

crustless quiche is good and reduces the egg monotony. You can add all sorts and a little meat goes a long way.

smoked mackeral v cheap! And delish.

Yum! Love smoked mackerel!

Quark ups the protein in almost anything. we have it in soup, on chili, with fruit or museli you name it.

Also fishsticks / surimi can be cheap but the protein varies by brand. They make a nice salad.

Any ideas if you don't eat meat? I do eat fish just don't like meat. I am also a crap cook so no idea what sort of things to do with fish other than salmon which I just cook in the oven. We have that once a week.

Chicken thighs are the biz - can't get them here for love nor money. (wtf?)

Lidl do a kilo of full-fat greek yoghurt for 1.99 euros (it's low-carb assuming you don't drizzle it in honey of course... )

Tinned sardines.

Nut (cashews/almonds) butter (avoid heavily processed and peanut obv.)

I can get 5/6 good sized filets of wild pacific salmon (frozen) in the supermarket for 5 euros - that's an awesome bargain!

neeps I do a lot of salmon based stir-frys, thai style, japanese style, indonesian etc. That way there can be rice or noodles for those in the household who do eat carbs.

Interesting thread, I need some inspiration too.

Yes, surimi salad is another one of my favourites:
surimi with lemon juice, olive oil, lots of pepper, some mustard and/or tabasco sauce.

Anyone got any good ratatouille style recipes?

I know many people who have successfully followed the "slow carb" diet, and done it on a budget too. It's really extremely simple - the summary is here

Basically, substitute plenty of pulses for where you would have carbs normally. You also get one "cheater" day a week. There is no reason why this diet should be any more expensive than a "normal" carb-heavy diet as pulses are very cheap, especially if you buy dried rather than canned. Black beans and flageolet beans in particular are delicious.

Other suggestions: olives (not just as snacks but for cooking), nuts, sardines, peppers. Mackerel is also very cheap and delicious butterflied, marinated in a bit of olive oil and lemon and grilled.

Sample menu:

Breakfast: 2 scrambled eggs, made with butter

Lunch: Salad made with flagolet beans, tomatoes, lettuce and sardines

Dinner: salmon (or pork loin) roasted on a bed of roast veg (peppers, toms and potatoes for the non-dieters), flavour with anchovies in the veg - cooked anchovies give an amazing salty, deep flavour to roast veg.

Quick midweek supper: big pan of black beans fried up with toms, onions, garlic, chillis. serve with grated cheese and big blob of sour cream or creme fraiche - lovely.

Snack on gherkins!

I struggle with breakfasts as I don't like porridge. You can't have eggs every day though (I heard 2 a week was recommended thinking of cholesterol?) so what other things could you have for breakfast? Could I learn to like porridge?

I have berries if they're in season, with double cream. Otherwise I like cheese, sundried tomatoes and deli meat. Not awfully cheap but for breakfast you don't eat a lot anyway.

If I have time I have a good-quality sausage crumbled with mushrooms and green peppers, cooked and then popped under the grill with a bit of grated cheese.

I am somewhat hesitant to have meat and cheese first thing in the morning, I just can't get my head around it being healthier than bloody honey cheerios which are probably packed with sugar .

What type of cheese and meat?

I love salami and brie and cambazola etc but surely SURELY these can't be allowed in a diet?

I think you need something mild. So an edam type cheese would be good. You can bake your our ham and eat that. Personally, I find Lidl Parma ham pretty good and fairly reasonably priced.

X posted MsR

TBH I can't see why those cheeses wouldn't be okay. I said mild because I can't handle strong flavours that early. But no reason not to.

You're not eating half a pound of the stuff. I find 3 or 4 fairly thinly sliced pieces of cheese along with 2 slices of ham is actually really pretty filling.

My big problem is I just can't cook. Just tried to make a salmon stir fry and it is totally unedible. Now have nothing for tea and have wasted loads of food.

Faaakin hell, ham, healthy.....[head explodes]

msrisotto: you certainly can have 2 eggs a day. The fear of cholesterol in eggs is based on a very simplistic model of how cholesterol is absorbed and the most recent research suggests that eating eggs (and many other kinds of dietary cholesterol) have a negligible effect on blood cholesterol levels.

Really really? I love eggs. This could be life changing....

I don't think there is a problem with good quality nice ham, its more the reconstituted stuffed with rusk crap thats to be avoided